Mountains and Marathons Challenge for Have a Heart Cayman Islands

On Sunday 21st November, 2016, the Have a Heart challenge continued in Havana, Cuba, with Derek Haines running the marathon supported by Chris and Kim Bailey running the half marathon race.

Chris, who recently completed an Iron Man race as part of the challenge, finished in a very respectable time of 2 hours 13 minutes whilst his wife Kim came in joint 3rd in her age group in 1 hour 41.

Derek placed 3rd in his age group in 4 hours. 03. He now has the Cayman marathon on the 4th December to complete this year’s challenges that included the 50K ‘Off the Beaten track”, 3 Bolivian mountain peaks with Vico Testori and Barry Yetton, Iron Man races by Shane Delaney and Chris Bailey and the 2 marathons.

Derek said, “It is a fun race and interesting although the spectators were nowhere near as involved as in Cayman; surprisingly quiet in fact. There are 3 fairly steep hills, so 6 for me as you go round the half marathon twice and that was a test on the second half.

There was a couple of unusual happenings. At the 11 mile mark a train blocked the route for a few minutes and the runners ground to a halt until it trundled on its way. Then a police officer allowed a bus to stop across the route with similar results.

Other than that the race was reasonably well organised and there were runners from all over the world.

The ‘Have a Heart’ charity, with the backing of the Rotary Club of Grand Cayman is attracting good support and over 130 children have now received life-saving/changing heart surgery at Health City as a result. Derek said, “Yet again the Cayman community has proved how generous they are in assisting with a worthy cause and I am most grateful for that.

If you wish to help go to MM4HH.com for details.